


oh take me back to the start

by sagexbrush



Series: how you get the girl [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, Love, child hood best friend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-28
Updated: 2015-08-28
Packaged: 2018-04-17 14:59:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4671002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sagexbrush/pseuds/sagexbrush
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Is your heart broken Stiles?” she asks softly.<br/>	“Is yours?”<br/>	“I think so,” her nose ghosts over the crook of his neck, and she inhales sharply. <br/>	“Mine is too.” (by you, he doesn’t add.) </p><p>(a childhood best friend au)</p>
            </blockquote>





	oh take me back to the start

**_i. first grade_ **

****

“But I want to play soccer too!” he protests, his voice rising slightly in his agitation, and his hands nervously beginning to twitch.

            “Sorry Stiles, but you _suck_ ,” one of the other boy’s says with a snide tone, and Stiles is once again reminded that he’s the new kid in this school, that these kids just are picking on him because he’s special (or that’s what his Mom says anyways.).

            “You’ve never even seen me play!”

            “Yeah but we can tell just from the look of you.”

            That doesn’t make any sense and he’s just about to say so when someone comes up behind him and startles him.

            “So you’re not letting him play either?” her small voice is cross and angry, it comes out of nowhere and makes him jump about a foot in the air.

            “We’ve already been over this Lydia,” the boy drawls (Stiles thinks his name is Jackson) rolling his eyes. “Girls can’t play soccer.”

            Lydia Martin, a small girl that Stiles had no reason to really notice before, marches up to Jackson, stomps down hard on his toes, and then promptly steals the soccer ball from his fingers.

            (She’s amazing.)

            The rest of the boys are too dumbstruck to do anything, and Lydia flounces away holding the ball in-between her arms. She casts one look over her shoulder, and he notices that her hair is curled like a princesses and that she’s wearing a pink t-shirt.

            “Well?” she asks him, “Aren’t you coming?”

            He trips over his own feet in his haste to follow her, and they end up playing soccer everyday at recess for the rest of the year.

            On the last day of school, the soccer ball resting between them and their heads tilted towards the sky, she asks him a question.

            “Are we best friends Stiles?” (it would be quite a difficult question, but they’re in first grade.)

            “Of course!”

            “Good.”

            And that was that.

           

**_ii. second grade_ **

****

In second grade, Lydia isn’t all that interested in in playing soccer anymore, but Stiles doesn’t really care. Being a best friend meant you had the same interests – right?

            Of course, when Lydia would rather play princesses with Allison, it becomes a little difficult, but he quickly settles for being the prince that comes and saves Lydia on a regular basis. (Allison insists that she saves herself, even when a boy named Scott eventually joins them and tries to do it for her.)

            He loves playing the games, even when it’s in the classroom and they’re drinking water from the art cups and pretending it’s tea.

            It’s when they’re away from school, at Stiles’ house or her own, that they still play soccer, kicking the ball back and forth with a methodical rhythm, and her complaining about the homework she gets which only takes her five minutes.

            He’s pretty sure she’s the smartest person he’s ever met (which is saying something because he knows a lot of people) and when he tells her so her little lips curl up into a smile and her curls bounce slightly more.

            One night, when he’s sleeping over at her house because his Mom and Dad are out of town, her parents start to scream at each other.

            He’s sleeping in a sleeping bag on her floor when it happens. He hears it first he thinks, the rushed hush of murmured voices that seeps through the floorboards like trickles of water.

            Eventually the voices begin to rise in pitch, getting more angry and more panicked, and Lydia wakes up. Instead of going to find out what’s happening (it’s what he would have done) she just sits up, and curls her knees to her chest, latching her arms around them.

            The words coming through the floorboards are more like a wave now, and it’s almost like the room is filling with water as it grows.

            “IT’S ALWAYS YOUR FAULT!” he hears first.

            “WE SHOULD NEVER HAVE HAD KIDS!” he hears next, and Lydia makes a small noise. He scrambles to his feet, the sleeping bag tangling around his feet and joins her on the bed, moving so he’s sitting in front of her.

            “I’m sorry that they’re so loud,” she mumbles into her knees.

            “It’s okay,” he says, “Are you okay?”

            “No,” she whispers, and then suddenly she’s throwing her arms around him and clinging to him like she might never let go and to be honest he had no idea what to do. He was only in the _second grade_ (but boys and girls could hug, right?).

            “I’m sure everything will be just fine in the morning,” he promises cheerily, not knowing quite what a promise was, but he did know that his parents fight sometimes and they always get over it eventually.

            She pulls back, and her eyes glimmer with a slight mischievous in the light from the moon.

            “Do you want to sneak out back and play soccer?”

            And so started Lydia Martin convincing him to do ridiculously stupid things that would most likely get him into trouble. 

****

**_iii. third grade_ **

****

It’s during the third grade when he starts to notice certain things about Lydia, like how she smells like strawberry chapstick and how her curls align her face _just so_ and how she’s always looping her arm around his and dragging him around and oh sweet lord – it’s what the girl’s call a ‘crush’ and the boys call ‘cooties’.

            He and Scott debate of the merits of a crush at the playground one day, while Allison and Lydia play some game involving sticks on the field.

            “What is the actual – what it does it really _mean_?” his (male) best friend finally asks, poking at the woodchips with one finger, “Like is it how Mom’s and Dad’s like each other?”

            “I think so,” Stiles says sagely, “But you can’t tell _anyone_ Scott.”

            “Not even Allison?”

            “ _Especially_ not Allison.”

            “Why especially not her?”

            “Because she’ll tell Lydia!”

            “She would?”

            “What else do you think they talk about at their ‘girls only’ sleepovers?”

            “Wait – they talk about _us_?” Scott looks alarmed at the very idea.

            “What else would they talk about?”

            “The newest Harry Potter movie?” Scott offers up weakly, and Stiles shakes his head firmly.

            “Sometimes you really are an idiot.”

            “Hey!”

 

 

**_iv. fourth grade_ **

              
            Lydia starts to get smaller. He thinks he’s the only one that notices though (he’s always noticing her) because her wrists stick out of her sweaters and her hair seems more unruly and there are dark circles under her eyes and she’s acting like someone else.

            “What’s wrong?” he finally asks her one day, after they’ve been partnered together in class and are supposed to be making a diagram of the human heart. She starts to scribble with her red crayon and barely looks up at him when he asks.

            “Parents are fighting,” she mumbles, “It’s too loud to sleep.”

            “Maybe you can come and stay at my house!” he says cheerily, because he can’t think of anything better, Lydia Martin, his ultimate crush, _staying_ at his house. “At least until they fix themselves.”

            “Do you think they can fix themselves?” she asks him honestly, and he gestures importantly at the paper that they’re drawing on.

            “Hearts are unbreakable,” he says firmly, “Sometimes they get a little cracked, but they’ll eventually get glued back together!”

            It’s surprisingly _wise_ for a nine year old, but it brings a smile to Lydia’s face and that makes everything okay.

            That day, he goes home with a picture of a heart in his backpack, and a smile on his face.

            When he walks through the door, preparing to gush to his parents about how he made his best friend _happy_ today , but instead finds them both sitting at the dining room table, his Father’s head in his hands and his Mother’s fingers tap tap tapping against the wooden surface.

            “Stiles?” his Mother’s voice is pained, and his Father doesn’t say anything. Stiles hesitates, one backpack strap hanging free and his face confused.

            “What’s wrong?” he’s always been smart for his age and he can obviously tell that something’s wrong.

            “We need to talk,” she says softly, like every word is a dagger into her side, and his Father swears under his breath.

            He goes to school the next day, and he doesn’t tell anyone but the words _Frontotemperal Dimensia_ are ringing in his head and his heart feels heavy in his chest.

            (He notices Lydia’s continued sadness.)

            (She doesn’t notice his.)

           

****

**_v. fifth grade_ **

****

He eventually stops going to school and instead spends all waking hours at the hospital. His eyes are going blurry from all the _white_ , and his back feels like it’s been permanently installed in the chair by his Mom’s bed.

            He supposes the teacher must have told the rest of the class by now, why Stiles has been gone for all this time, why he probably won’t be coming back for a while, and that’s why he gets a call from Scott and Allison one night, their voices filled with the latest elementary gossip.

            (Lydia doesn’t call.)

            He slumps in his chair, looking at his fingers, his backpack filled with the work his teacher’s had given him resting at his feet. He’d already done it all, and checked the answers twice.

            There was nothing left to do then look at his Mother’s face, and pray that something would swoop down out of the sky and make her better. That’s how it worked in the movies right? Something _happened_. A miracle or some other form of magic, and everything would be okay because his Mom was a _good person_.

            His Father is at work (when you’re the sheriff there’s only so much time you can take off) but Stiles was given a pass off school indefinitely. So he could watch as the life faded from his Mother’s cheeks as she slept.

            “Stiles?” it’s a small voice, nervous, like she isn’t sure she belongs there.

            His head flits to the doorway to see Lydia Martin, standing with her backpack on her shoulders and her hands tucked into her jeans pockets.

            “Lydia?”

            She steps forward into the room a little bit more, and he can see Mrs. Martin just behind her, but lingering in the hallway like she wants to give the two kids time.

            “I heard about what happened to your Mom,” she says quietly, her eyes flitting to the bed where his Mom was sleeping. Something like remorse flits across her face but then she’s firmly looking back at Stiles, her hands fiddling in her pockets.

            Under any other normal circumstance, he’d probably be jumping off the walls at the fact that she wants to visit him, that she’s here and real – but his Mother is dying in her bed and he can’t really bring himself to be happy.

            “Yeah,” he whispers, his eyes casting back towards the floor.

            “I brought some games,” she goes on, moving so she’s sitting in the chair next to him (his Dad usually takes that chair but he doesn’t mind this new replacement) and pulling her backpack off her shoulders.

            He brightens slightly at the idea, because if there’s one thing the hospital doesn’t have it’s _games_.

            “What ones?”

            “Sorry, Monopoly, Connect Four,” she says, rattling her bag so that the pieces inside their boxes jangle and clack together.

            “Thank you,” he whispers, as she pulls out the board games and lies them down on the floor.

            (When Claudia wakes next, it’s to the sound of giggles and Stiles proclaiming that Lydia’s cheated and that she _can’t_ do that.)

            His Mom dies two weeks later, holding his hand, and he sits out in the hall and collapses into his hands, until his Father comes storming down with tears running down his face. 

            When he goes to school, Lydia’s parents are divorced and his Mom is gone and the two of them just sit on the benches in the playground, their eyes blank and the other kids scared of their grief.

           

****

**_vi. sixth grade_ **

 

                    He has his first panic attack on the first day of school.

                    It’s the first day without his Mom.

                    It’s the first day of school she hasn’t brushed his hair with a wet comb.

                    It’s the first time he’s had stale cereal for breakfast on the first day instead of bacon and eggs.

                    It’s the first day he’s ridden the school bus.

                    It’s the first day Lydia ignores him.

                    He opens his mouth to say hello to her, but she flounces past him and lands in front of Jackson, taunting him with a knowing smile. The kind of smile she usually reserved for _Stiles_. Allison giggles knowingly when she does so and Scott  and him exchange confused looks.

                    It puts an uneasy feeling in his stomach and he fidgets nervously.

                    It’s when Lydia chooses to sit next to Jackson instead of him that it finally crashes over him and he doesn’t quite know what to do.

                    Over the summer, Stiles read a lot.

                    He learned something rather substantial about anxiety.

                    Anxiety attacks built up.

                    Panic attacks came out of nowhere.

                    He lets out a moan, pins and needles shaking under his skin and bile rising in his throat, tears welling in his eyes. He was sitting at his Lydia-free desk, but now he’s standing up, backing up quickly, his head smashing against the door.

                    “Stiles?” he thinks it’s Scott, but his best friend is blurry, and suddenly it feels like a weight is sitting on his chest, something heavy that _won’t_ move.

                    He can hear voices crashing over his ears like water, and he’s drowning drowning drowning and he can’t breathe and oh sweet jesus is this what his Mother felt like before she died?

                    Eventually the teacher comes over and the choked sobs finally escape his chest, until he sinks back against the door and shakes against it. The teacher is snapping their fingers in front of his eyes and Stiles realizes one thing as everything slowly comes back into focus.

                    One, Lydia is sitting on his hand in her concern over him, her eyes wide and her breath tickling his hair.

                    Two, the rest of the kids in the class are _laughing_. Cackling, like his pain is something to find funny.

                    He pushes Lydia away. (She probably doesn’t want to be seen with someone like him anyways.)

                   

 

****

**_vii. seventh grade_ **

They switch schools.

                    It shouldn’t be a bigger hassle than it is, but Junior High is like the most _overrated change_ of your life.

                    Scott seems plenty nervous though, and quietly confesses to Stiles that he might possibly like Allison.

                    Which of course brings Stiles back to Lydia.

                    They had grown apart last year, she had obviously wanted to be more popular and he had wanted things to stay the same, and that didn’t tend to lead to a stable friendship.

                    Whatever. It wasn’t like he needed Lydia Martin.

                    (Which was a total lie by the way.)

                    His panic attacks have been under control for about three months now, but he almost has another one when he sees her walk through the door.

                    Her skirt is short, her lipstick is fresh, and she looks like she just walked off one of those ads for department stores where kids bounce up and down in their new outfits.

                    He knows Scott is looking at Allison (who’s arm-in-arm with Lydia) when his best friend swears under his breath, but Stiles can’t help but wince. Out of all the people he had to like – it had to be her?

                    “Hey Stiles,” she says cheerily, because they like to pretend like everything’s okay because it’s easier than trying to fix what’s broken.

                    “Hey Lyds,” he says lightly, and then pretends to be deeply immersed in a conversation with Scott so they don’t have to have anymore fake conversations where she pretends to still like soccer and he pretends that he doesn’t have nightmares every night.

                    (But when is he is awake and they avidly avoid each other in the halls, he still remembers a girl with princess curls and grass stained knees and board games in the hospital.)

                    (and of course he’s still desperately in love with her. It’s no use pretending it’s a crush or cooties anymore.)

****

**_vii. eighth grade_ **

****

Everyone loves the Lydia they think they know.

                    She wears little heels now and lipstick and always is on point, but is adorably stupid and always is up for a good spot of fun.

                    It’s not the real Lydia though, not the Lydia Stiles remembers, with her impossibly smart attitude and her witty words.

                    Not that he really talks to Lydia anymore, what’s the point when she would rather giggle with Allison or flirt with Jackson?

                    They get partnered together in science, and she takes extra long on the worksheet, her lips pouting and her forehead scrunched together.

                    “I know you know how to do this,” Stiles snaps, suddenly irritated, “Just do them at your speed.”

                    She pretends to be offended. “I don’t know how to –“

                    “Yes you do,” he snaps, “You’re a freaking genius and you’re just acting stupid for no reason.”

                    He has to give accounts to her acting abilities though, when her eyes fill with fake tears and her lips get even more sad.

                    “I thought you were my friend!” she hisses, and he has a twinge of guilt before remembering that she’s trying to play him like everyone else.

                    “Fine, lie to me like you lie to everyone else,” he snarls and pulls his paper to him with more desperation, “But just remember that I like the real you – not like Jackson.”

                    “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asks angrily.

                    “You know.”

                    “No, I don’t,” she whispers, and then stands up and moves to sit by Jackson. He supposes this is really the end of their friendship.

                    (But it really ended when she started to be someone else and he decided to remain the same.)

****

**_ix. ninth grade_ **

                   

                    The whole school cheers when Lydia and Jackson get together. To them, it’s been a matter of ‘will they, won’t they’. To him, it’s been hell.

                    So when he spots Lydia and Jackson walking hand in hand down the hallway, Jackson practically _glowing_ with the power he holds, he has this strange urge to find the nearest chair and chuck it at his head.

                    Instead of pretending they have a friendship, they pretend it never happened.

                    He watches her and Jackson kiss in the halls, watches Scott and Allison dance around each other on tip toes, watches his Father drown himself to sleep each night and watches  the shadows grow under his own eyes when he realizes that no one’s there to play board games or soccer anymore – no that changed with his Mother.

                    Everything changed with his Mother.

                    So he watches.

                    He watches and cracks jokes and pretends he’s not in love with Lydia and pretends like he can be normal and like he’s not drowning constantly every second of every day, because it all hurts too much.

                    He tells his Mother’s grave this, literally pours out his soul to a stone and wishes it could talk back. However frightening, he wishes that sometimes ghosts existed so his Mother could give him some goddamn _advice_ on how to make his life into a nice pretty straight line again.

****

**_x. tenth grade_ **

****

There always comes a point when you simply cannot pretend to be _okay_ anymore, when all the stored panic attacks quivering under your skin rise up your throat until the hallway is blurring around you and your stumbling, pushing people out of the way in your haste to get somewhere _safe_.

                    “Stiles?” there’s a voice, Lydia’s voice, but he thinks he must be imagining things because _Lydia Martin_ didn’t talk to people like Stiles. Her words were reserved for people like Jackson and Allison and occasionally Scott but never _him_. “Are you okay?”

                   He wasn’t quite sure why people used that word so much: _okay_. It was such a stupid word, like what did it really even mean? It didn’t even make any sense.

                    “I’m having a panic attack,” he finally gasps, because the words are the only ones that truly fit the situation, truly feel real.

                    The person in front of them (whoever they are) inhales sharply, and he feels a small soft hand tugging on his own, and he feels himself being pulled after someone, his heartbeat loud in his ears and his breathing coming in sharp gusts through his mouth.

                    The smell of the air changed to something slightly more rancid, and he’s having even more trouble breathing, the person leading him, and his mind is still hallucinating, thinking that the person in front of him is _Lydia_ , but it can’t be – can it?

                    He isn’t even sure what’s triggered this particular panic attack, but he can’t even see straight, falling backwards and slamming into something hard.

                    “Think of something happy!” her voice is saying, and there are fingers flitting across his face and the smell of something sweet near.

                    He can’t think of something happy, just like when you’re drowning you can’t be peaceful until you let the water in and he’s pretty sure he’s going to be in agony forever and oh sweet  -

                    Suddenly his world is on fire as whoever’s with him shoves their mouth against his, their lips soft and their smell almost exactly like her’s, and it’s like walking into a bright ray of sunlight, his breathing stops completely, and he’s able to see who he’s kissing and oh god –

                    Lydia Martin pulls away softly, her eyes flicking up to meet his, and he wonders if he’s going to have another panic attack just by her kissing him. (He just kissed Lydia Martin. And he was 95% that she was still dating Jackson. What. The. Hell?)

                    “Why – why did you do that?” he finally mumbles, his eyes not moving from her own.

                    She looks down at her knees, embarrassed.

                    “I read somewhere that holding your breath could stop a panic attack, so when I kissed you – you held your breath.”

                    “Oh,” he sighs, looking down at his fingers. He’s doubly surprised when she reaches out and rests her own hands on top of his.

                    “Are you having panic attacks again?” she asks, and he almost thinks that he can hear the concern in her voice. (He must be imagining things.)

                    “That’s the first one in a while,” he says truthfully, but doesn’t add that it’s because he’s been bottling up and that was the explosion.

                    “Oh.”

                    He’s suddenly aware that they’re kneeling on the dirty locker room floor, and that her cheeks are pink and he’s just _kissed_ her like he’s been _daydreaming_ for ages.

                    “Lyd – “

                    “I’ve got to go find Jackson,” she says quickly, getting up off the floor, dusting off her dress, and practically running from the locker room.

                    (He suspects the kiss just complicated things even more.)

 

**_xi. eleventh grade_ **

****

Eleventh grade (at least in the terms of Lydia) is going just about the same as the last five years, except there’s an awkward tension in the air between them that _certainly_ wasn’t there before, and was most likely caused by the kiss that had transgressed between them.

                    He’s lying awake in his bed, playing some stupid game on his phone that’s probably rotting his brain but whatever  - when his message tone chimes and the message lights up on his screen.

                    _Are you up?_ The sender reads Lydia Martin, and Stiles (because he’s Stiles) immediately texts back.

                    _no. sleeping obviously._

_I’m outside of your house._

_wat._

_The correct word is what, and I’m pretty sure my message was simple. I’m outside your house. Want to play some soccer?_

He stares at his phone in shock for a second, then looks at his alarm clock (it reads 12:02) and then scrambles to the window. Leaning against his jeep is Lydia Martin, her phone in one hand a soccer ball in the other.

                    _fine._ He sends back, and then scrambles out the door (his Dad is working late tonight.)

                    “Sorry to disrupt you beauty sleep,” she says dryly, and he quickly realizes that he had forgotten to change out of his pajamas (and they have flying pigs on them only because his Aunt Muriel got them for him okay.)

                    “Hey, I have to maintain this,” he gestures towards his face, “Somehow.”

                    She tucks her phone in her pocket and rolls the soccer ball in her hands.

                    “So want to play soccer?”

                    “ _Now_?”

                    “No Stiles, I drove all this way to ask you for tomorrow – yes now. Or are you too scared to be caught by your Daddy?” she pouts, tilting her head to the side and giving him a devilish look.

                    “I’ve got balls,” he protests, stepping forward and taking the soccer ball from her. She giggles.

                    “According to Malia, you have _quite_ the balls.”

                    He stares at her slack jawed for a moment, he hadn’t expected his ex-girlfriend to run around _telling_ people about their sex life.

                    “Shut up Martin,” he growls, “Do you want to play soccer or not?”

                    She nods firmly, “I do. But can you do something for me Stiles?”

                    He looks at her curiously, “And that is?”

                    “Distract me,” she whispers, and he sees a flit of pain across her features.

                    In response he kicks the ball at her in surprise, causing her to shriek and pull back in alarm.

                    That’s how, after they drive to the soccer field and play soccer for six consecutive hours (he sent his Dad a text but he was pretty sure he was going to be dead by the time he got home) he learned that she broke up with Jackson.

                    “He wasn’t who I thought he was,” she explains morosely, and Stiles waggles a finger at her.

                    “Told you so.”   

                    “You did not!”

                    “Did too!”          

                    He had been pretty sure, like yesterday or something, that he was almost getting over Lydia Martin.

                    He fell in love with her (or back in love, take your pick) on the soccer ball, where they had grass stained knees and just existed.

                    (When he told Scott the next day, the boy whistled and told Stiles he was screwed.)

                    (Stiles rather had to agree.)

 

**_xii. twelfth grade (senior year)_ **

 

                    He and Lydia fall back into being friends fairly easily, and she cheers him on when he attempts to play lacrosse and he actually learns how to paint her fingernails and they try to forget about the time they spent apart because it’s painful as all hell.

                    It isn’t until prom rolls around that the problem occurs.

                   “Will you go with me Stiles?” she asks, her eyes wide and her lips pouty. He simply stares at her.

                    “Prom?” he repeats, and then louder, “Prom?!”

                    “As friends,” she clarifies quickly, “I just don’t want to look like a loner and I don’t want to find a date.”

                    He knows she means that she’s still not over that douchebag, but he’s her best friend and _good god_ the things he will do to make this girl smile.

                    So she buys a pretty silky dress and he buys a tuxedo that matches and a corsage for her and their parents take pictures of them and coo at their ‘adorableness’ even if they’re _just friends_.

                    Prom is basically a bunch of cardboard stars hanging from the ceiling and guys looking uncomfortable and girls wobbling in their heels while everyone desperately wishes someone would just _spike the punch_ already so it could be more fun.

                    Lydia looks gorgeous (of course) in a dress of pretty teal silk and her hair all curled and her eyes big and illuminated by mascara, her lips a ruby red.

                    “Get off your cute little ass and dance honey bunches,” he tells her cheerily, pulling her to her feet and onto the dance floor. (He might as well make the most of this while he can.)

                    “Do you remember what you said to me in fourth grade Stiles?” she whispers softly into his ear, and her breath feels like silk.

                    “I said a lot of things in fourth grade.”          

                    “That hearts were unbreakable, and all they needed was some glue to get stuck back together?” she prompts.

                    He does remember when he said that, mostly because that was the real day that everything changed.

                    “Well I lied, didn’t I?” he says, because it’s true. “I was a fourth grader who didn’t know any better.”

                    “Is your heart broken Stiles?” she asks softly.

                    “Is yours?”

                    “I think so,” her nose ghosts over the crook of his neck, and she inhales sharply.

                    “Mine is too.” (by you, he doesn’t add.)

                    “I think I can fix it though – my heart,” she says, pulling back slightly so she can look him in the eyes and he thinks _this is the moment_ , this moment right here where she would realize that he was so much better than Jackson or any other jackass that could hope to even give her the time of the day.

                    “What do you mean?”  he asks her, hoping she’ll say _by loving you._

                    “I think Jackson and I are getting back together,” she tells him, and a different moment occurs. Not the one Stiles is thinking of, but a different one – where he stops believing that the people who deserve it, the ones who try their best to be good and go through hell to do so – get the girl. The world didn’t work like that.

                    He pulls away. “Then why did you come to prom with me?”

                    She smiles, like it’s going to fix anything. “Because I wanted one last moment with the two of us.”

                    He doesn’t know what to say, because it’s selfish. “You know how my heart is broken?”

                    “Yes?”

                    “You’re the one who broke it,” the words are out of his mouth before he can stop them, “You stomped it to pieces when you started wearing lipstick and pretending to be stupid and dating Jackson and being everything you’re not and god damn it Lydia you’re going to win the Nobel Peace Prize or something some day with your smarts and your wasting them by chasing after someone who doesn’t love you like I do.”

                    She’s staring at him in shock, and mumbles something about a fields metal and his fists clench.

                    “Stiles – “

                    “You don’t,” he finally realizes, his world crashing down, “You don’t love me back.”

                    She looks like her world is crashing down too, “Not – not like that,” she stutters, and he laughs a horrible hollow laugh.

                    “Well then, I guess this is goodbye Lydia,” he says, and turns and leaves it all behind. He leaves behind the girl with princess curls and the soccer balls and board games in the hospital room – he leaves it all behind.

                    When he looks back (because everyone looks back damn it) she’s standing in the middle of the dance floor, her eyes filled with tears and he can see Jackson making his way towards her.

                    (He still loves her.)  

****

 

**Author's Note:**

> i can have another part if anyone wants one?


End file.
